To expand the CUDA programming community, NVIDIA has partnered with Udacity to offer an online class in Parallel Programming. Learn more >

Developer Support

Developers worldwide -- in academia, science, medicine, automobile manufacturing, gaming, and numerous other industries -- are changing the way we work and play with the introduction of innovative technologies. To help enable them to improve existing tools, develop new functionalities and grow new markets, NVIDIA actively engages a worldwide network of programmers, researchers, students, scientists and partner enterprises.

In our offices around the world, NVIDIA’s multilevel support for developers is integral to our day-to-day business. We provide them with diverse resources, including courses in parallel programming; enhancement tools for debugging, performance and testing; access to highly skilled engineers and specialists who provide custom services and co-design industry-specific applications; and financial support in the case of university researchers in various scientific disciplines.

Additionally, we have established robust mechanisms for communicating with, and facilitating interaction among, developers through targeted discussion forums and conferences.

We have learned from two decades in the business the importance of listening closely to what developers want and need. Our world-class designers continually work ahead of the curve to develop products that will contribute to customers’ success and push new standards of creativity, usability and sustainability.

Developer Centers

We organize our comprehensive developer support into four broad categories, as outlined below.

Gaming
When we invented the GPU in 1999, we caused a paradigm shift in the computer industry. To help developers learn what was possible in an emerging new world of gaming, we taught them how to build products to maximize the technology and make games more compelling for users. The video game market is expected to reach $82 billion by 2016, and NVIDIA GPUs are vital in helping to underpin its success.

Our support for game developers includes code samples and utilities, best practices, support for our 3D Vision technology, tools to create physics effects, rendering enhancement for PCs, and an authoring framework that allows artists to create high-level, dynamic systems without any programming. We also work directly with game companies to help them optimize the power of their GPUs.

Professional Graphics
As more possibilities for our technology emerged in the early years of our company, we expanded our developer support network to encompass CAD users, including filmmakers, automobile designers and architects, to help them improve the impact of their work. Over the years, our Quadro team has worked with many of the world’s leading software developers to create NVIDIA-powered solutions.

Today, everything from shampoo bottles to jumbo jets to Hollywood films are created with software that runs on NVIDIA Quadro. All films nominated for the Best Visual Effects Oscar for the past four years were created on Quadro workstations. Quadro , when combined with our Tesla high-performance computing solution, is also making huge breakthroughs in medical imaging.

CUDA
The GPU had been on the market for only a few years when research scientists began exploring a nonvisual use for its powerful programming elements: executing complex computational tasks. To support these efforts, we released in 2006 CUDA, a parallel computing platform and programming model that enables dramatic increases in computing performance and significantly expands the industries that can benefit from using our technology.

The possible applications of CUDA are enormous. Auto manufacturers can build computerized models to test aerodynamics and safety features, thus avoiding the use of environmental resources to construct physical models. Medical researchers can boost the speed at which they process DNA to detect cell abnormalities. Financial experts can use Monte Carlo simulations to improve the accuracy of stock market predictions. The national defense and intelligence community can more efficiently process data from satellites, UAVs, surveillance cameras and radar, allowing significant increases productivity while reducing cost, power, and facilities use.

Our comprehensive support to university-level CUDA users includes training, collaboration, and financial assistance. CUDA is now taught at more than 560 universities in 40 countries, including dozens of CUDA Centers of Excellence and CUDA Research and Training Centers. The creative genius available in academic/research institutions was highlighted during the recent CUDA Centers of Excellence Achievement Awards, accentuating the value NVIDIA provides by nurturing these educational ties.

Mobile Development

The market for smartphones and tablets has exploded in recent years, and NVIDIA is helping developers satisfy the world’s desire for a near limitless range of mobile computing apps. Our Tegra family of mobile processors enables the creation of engaging experiences on mobile devices and superior navigation, safety and infotainment experiences for automobile drivers. We provide a development platform, code samples, white papers, tools, and a forum for enhancing this emerging technology.

In 2013, we are introducing Kayla, a platform to support developers who want to create supercomputing applications for mobile. We have also released Jetson, which allows developers to easily create and test automotive and computer-vision applications to provide enhanced safety and entertainment systems for tomorrow’s cars.